Right-wing populist parties
and the rise of hate crimes

DVPW 2024, Göttingen

Heike Klüver

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Jasper Jansen

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Tim Wappenhans

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

September 26, 2024

Motivation

Hate crimes on the rise

news_01
The Guardian
news_02
Associated Press
news_03
Deutsche Welle

Preview

Research Question

Does local right-wing party representation induce hate crimes?

Design

  • DiD
  • 6,390 German municipalities
  • 2010-2020

Results

  • no effect
  • normalization of hate
    • nat./state level > local level

Theory

Argument

Social identity theory

  • in-group
    • comply with norms
  • out-group
    • perceived as threat

Populist radical right parties

  • nativism
    • the nation
  • populism
    • the people

Creation of distinct in-group, under attack by threatening out-group ⚡

Data

Case

German municipalities

  • lowest administrative level
  • most direct point of contact
  • potential for normalization of hate

Hate crimes in Germany

Hate crimes in Germany

Hate crimes in Germany

Hate crimes in Germany

Hate crimes in Germany

Challenge

Changing municipality borders

Estimation

Data

  • 6,390 (synthetic) municipalities, 2010-2020
  • 68,475 municipality*years
  • right-wing hate crimes per 100,000
  • treatment: AfD in municipality council

Design

  • staggered DiD
  • no conditioning on covs
  • SE clustered at municipality level

Results

Aggregated ATT

Exploring heterogeneity

Results may be different for

  • treatment cohorts

  • ideological motivation

  • treatment intensities

  • violent crimes

Treatment cohorts

Ideological motivation


Treatment intensity


Violent crimes

Conclusion

Takeaway 🥡


  • local PRR presence does not increase hate crimes

    • ideological motivation ❌
    • treatment intenstiy ❌
    • violent crimes ❌

  • normalization: national/state level > local level

Next steps

What do do

  • collecting missing data for remaining states
  • addressing multilevel nature of treatment
    • local, state, national level
  • further ideas welcome




Hit us up 📬

heike.kluever@hu-berlin.de

jasperj@mit.edu

tim.wappenhans@hu-berlin.de

Appendix

Event study